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Sunday, 31 May 2009

My son flies his kite in the pasturewhile I jump from bog hump to humpchasing the tail of the flying paper shape.Wind the string in; reel it out--releasing the triangular bird into layers of breeze.I show him about playing the wind--dancing our feet, fingering a lofty tugfrom the upwardly dashing kite.

There's no cutting the linewhen a child flies a kite--no letting go.He has me help in the chase.I run back with the stay,preventing the kite's dive down to earth.I show my son how the working of line,the playing with draftis a fine use of higher spaces.

Sunday, 24 May 2009

A hole in the sky where gravitydoesn’t apply. Small objectsflick into the ether beyond.

Outdoors at the Japanese restaurantby the falls we notice plastictableware and dishes of sauce rise and disappear. The waiter,when we ask where the objects go,prefers to speak no English. Metal tableware and our platesremain but look uneasy,and your hair stands up like a ruff.

Still, the squat red candles blaze,the sushi arrives and remains herelong enough for us to eat it. We enjoy the sizzle of waterover the falls, play of floodlightson the flecks of vegetable foam and twigs

breaking their backson the rocks below. The waiterglances up at that hole and smiles.

Some of the other diners moveindoors, unhappy with the tugof the heavens. Despite the fluff

Wednesday, 20 May 2009

the bus stops are filled with smoke,magician's disappearing actswhich leave only ashesand transparent ghosts of words on flaking benches.the sour taste of cold metal keysat the back of everybody's throats;the spark of dying bulbs as they flickerlike dim signals of distress over oil-steeped water.girls in plaid and steel observe the starsmelting into dawn like mints under their own tongues,raise their arms longer than sentences,shorter than silence,until they could be waving aside the graycoiling clouds like golden giants,wanting to feel that moisture against their fingertips,to feel it snaking down thin white wrists,serpentine and acidic. Sierra Jasmine Skinner, Newfoundland, Canada

A mile below in the valleyrain is tapping on fogged windows.The gently pinging litany of the drizzleis the prayer of hope for Spring flowers.

It is this cycle that engorges each washwith rock crushing watercascading into shallow streamsswelling finally into the green riverthat once ran to the Sea of Cortez.

But the sea no longer tastes the snowmelt.Red canyons are drowned behind concrete dams.Now the moisture is scattered helplessly into the airabove the thirsty creosote and sajuaro plainby fountains, stale artificial lakes,swimming poolsand golf course greens.

Still, the clouds return from the Pacificand the cycle begins anew each seasondespite this broken spoke in the wheel.And a river that searches for the Sea of Cortezrushes to a pointless death in Phoenix, Arizona,never to rise from the ashes again.

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